


Afterlives and Arrangements

by lucky_spike



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures, Problem Sleuth (Webcomic)
Genre: F/M, M/M, Makeouts galore, Rocks Fall Everyone Dies, terrible crossovers, why would anyone write this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-15
Updated: 2011-09-15
Packaged: 2017-10-23 18:23:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/253472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucky_spike/pseuds/lucky_spike
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Spike murders every major character in the Homestuck intermission and Problem Sleuth, creates a weak crossover, develops absolutely no plot, and smushes characters' faces together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Afterlives and Arrangements

**Author's Note:**

> I have no apologies. Read at your own risk.
> 
> Title is with many thanks to Path. :)
> 
> I guess I should note that this is really loosely stabdads and _**OBVIOUSLY HUGELY AU FUTUREFIC.**_

The afterlife was a topic Spades Slick had never given a particularly large amount of thought to. While psychiatrists and psychoanalysts would fixate on that as a statement about his relationship with his own mortality and denial of impending death, the hard truth of the matter was that the afterlife was never really a thing he’d seen much point in thinking about. You died, and wherever you ended up, well … whatever. It was what it was.

He’d _really_ avoided thinking about it since Sleuth had died five years ago, because he reasoned the less he thought about it, the more he could convince himself there was one. Sleuth wasn’t gone, he was just on some terrific fucking adventure with … unicorns or whatever the fuck you did after you died. He was just … away. Not gone.

But when Slick was faced with the prospect of going away and embarking on the wonderful journey himself, however, he found he was more than a little uncertain.

It hadn’t been a good day so far. He’d died, which was a negative point in pretty much everyone’s book, probably. And he’d been alerted to his passing when he’d woken up from his drunken stupor, or what he thought was a drunken stupor anyway but was apparently actually _death_ , and been ogled at by a seven and a half foot skeleton. That was bad enough, but then you got to add insult to injury when he’d tried to jump behind the couch, and got caught on that stupid … whatever that string thing was that connected your soul to your corpse and ended up hanging over the back of the sofa, half-suspended in the air.

And then the fucking skeleton had cut the string.

Turns out falling on a hardwood floor still hurts when you’re dead.

On the plus side, he thought, he had all his limbs back. Not the eye though – something about that window to the soul bullshit, probably. The mortal fucking plane had also faded away in pretty short order, which meant he didn’t have to hang around and watch droves of people cry over him. Which there would certainly be. Definitely.

And fucking Snowman would be so grief stricken so would probably cry for hours and write sad poetry in her journal and float through the rest of her endless interminable fucking existence wrought with torment.

… Today wasn’t getting better.

Then the gates of Hell swirled and solidified out of the gray and nebulous mists of limbo. Slick had never seen the gates of Hell before, but they were sort of distinctive. Black, probably wrought iron or steel or something, spiky, generally Hellish. A few impaled skulls here and there, just for accent points.

It wasn’t surprising. It also wasn’t doing anything for his mood. “Fuck this,” he told the reaper, which simply ogled him. And then he gestured to the gates, politely insisting that Slick head toward them.

Slick stuck his hands in his pockets. At least he was wearing a suit. “What if I don’t go?” He jerked his head toward the gates. “Not the most fucking appealing prospect.” The scythe hit him across the back of the head. “Fuck! Fine.” He looked around, to the burning wasteland littered with skeletons, and possible heinous abominations. And then back to the gates, towering and awful. Screams were ringing through the valley. Terrible, awful screams, unintelligible …

Yes, definitely unintelligible …

Screams that totally didn’t fucking sound like Clubs Deuce …

Fucking shit.

“Boss! Boss!” Yup, there was the stupid little nugget, just behind the gates, waving Slick over. The world’s least intimidating demon. “Come on, Boss, over here! The big gates!”

“I fucking see you,” Slick snapped. He paused and looked for the reaper, but this time he realized he was alone; Death had vanished. So, with no other immediate options, he stalked over to the gates. Two smoky figures coalesced behind Clubs, and were suddenly recognizable. Slick stopped five feet short of them, blinking furiously.

A small door in the one gate swung open. “You coming in or not?” Hearts asked. “We got places to be.”

“The fuck are you supposed to be?”

“Demons, you idiot, now get in here,” Droog snapped. “Honestly.” Slick stepped through the door, which clanked shut with a heavy, definitive scrape.

“Gosh, Boss, it sure took you a while to die,” Clubs said, before attaching himself to Slick’s torso in a rib-crushing hug. “We were waiting forever.” He released Slick and stepped back, pensive. “Well, it felt like forever, anyway.”

Slick was looking around, taking in the wailing souls who, by and large, really weren’t wailing all that much. They just seemed to be … waiting. Bored. Any wailing that was done was done in frustration, it seemed, or … something else. Impatience.

“What’s going on here?” he asked, falling into step beside Droog as the taller man led the way through the huddles of lost souls. “What’s everyone waiting for?”

“Nothing.” Droog smirked. “They’re just waiting.”

Slick looked to a line of plastic chairs and caught a whiff of cheap vending machine coffee. “And this is Hell?” He looked to Droog, and then tried not to stare when he noticed the horns. Reddish black, curved, Karkat’s size with a point to them. Demon horns.

“This is the waiting room.” Droog pushed open a swinging door and grabbed Slick under the arm, pulling him through, as Hearts and Clubs strolled behind. “Eternal suffering doesn’t have to be all torture and gnashing of teeth, really; indefinite periods of waiting in minor discomfort are nearly as effective and much less labor-intensive.” He smirked. “Not that we don’t all enjoy the more hands-on parts of the job.”

“I can see you took to this like a fucking fish to water.”

Droog shrugged, “It’s not that different from what I did with the army in Derse, really. Maximize one commodity while minimizing cost.”

“An economy of suffering, huh?”

“Yes. Although –”

“ _Hey_! Why’s he get to go through right away, huh?” A man was stepping forward, out of the long line snaking around the corner. “He just got here – I’ve been waiting here forever!” Hearts caught him on the shoulder and shoved him back against the wall. “Fuck you!” The man bolted forward again, and this time he came swinging.

It was like the Crew had never broken up. Like Droog hadn’t left Slick eight years ago, skinny and gasping for air he could never really get, like Clubs hadn’t blown himself up, like Hearts’ heart hadn’t crapped out. Like they weren’t dead and never had been.

The only person missing was Sleuth and his goddamn stupid key ring.

They finished the guy when Slick’s horse hitcher – apparently that had followed him to the afterlife, he always knew he could count on it – cracked into his temple and his head flew off, bouncing down the hall past the horrified people in line.

Slick whirled on the waiting souls. “Anyone else have a fucking problem?” The line seemed to shrink back. “Good.” He turned back to the Crew. Droog was smirking. “I hate it when you look fucking smug.” He looked around. “Where’s Clubs?”

Hearts jerked his thumb down the hall. “Went after the head. Guy’s gonna need it back.” He started walking again. “He’ll catch up.”

Slick moved in next to Droog again, and he’d forgotten how much he had to hurry to keep up with the guy. “Nice horns, asshole.”

“You’ll have your own soon enough.”

Slick squinted up at him. “That where we’re going?”

Droog nodded as Hearts – two steps ahead – pushed open a set of double doors and lead the way down the tiled hall. “Meeting the boss.”

“Can’t say I much like the idea of having a boss,” Slick grumbled, glowering at the empty hall around them. There was a door at the end of the hall, and it shimmered red for a second before Hearts pushed it open and the three of them stepped through.

The hallway beyond could have been in _Casino_ ’s back offices, as generic as it was. Grey carpet, beige walls, fluorescent lighting, quiet. Each office had a glass window that looked out into the hall, and every single window had the blinds pulled down. From behind one of the doors there was a horrified scream, and then a cackle, before it all gave way to the hushed murmur of resumed discussion. “Infernal offices?” Slick guessed. “Selling souls and all that?”

“Naturally.” Droog and Hearts pulled up short outside of a door, Slick between them. It was a simple steel door, white, nothing special. The nameplate on it read ‘Crawly’. On duct tape, underneath that, someone had written ‘AJ Crowley’ in Sharpie. Hearts knocked, and then pushed it open.

“Spades Slick,” Hearts said quietly, leaning to the crack in the door.

“Huh? Oh. Oh! Come on, you four, come in, have a seat.” Spades stepped through the door, and ducked under the verdant branch of some sort of highly-cultivated domestic tree. “Don’t mind the plants, they’ll get out of the way. Won’t they?” The last was said with a hint of threat, and Slick would have sworn the tree shivered. He looked to the man – demon, Crawly, whatever – and dropped into his seat when his knees stopped working.

“You’re Andrew Cowley,” he said, distantly. The demon behind the desk grinned broadly and leaned forward, shaking Slick’s hand, a flash of yellow visible behind the Ray-Bans.

“I wondered if you’d remember!”

“The head of human resources?” Slick confirmed. “At _Casino_? For the past fifteen years?” His eyes narrowed. “You vanished six months ago. D’you get iced?”

“Ha, no!” He waved a hand, which was suddenly full of wine bottle. “Drinks, anyone? No? Nah, Droog, you want some, there you are. Hearts? Fine, suit yourself.” He took a sip of the wine – red, and Slick’s brain wanted to fantasize that it was blood but his nose insisted it was a very nice Merlot – and sighed. “No, I was just done scouting you out. Knew you’d be along shortly. How’s being dead, adjusting alright?”

“Oh. Yeah,” Slick lied. “No big deal.”

“Ah, you’ll have it sorted out soon enough.” He gulped back another mouthful of wine and smacked his tongue on the top of his mouth. And then he hissed, not hissed like a person would hiss in anger or pain, but actually _hissed_ , like a six-foot tall viper in sunglasses. “You sure you don’t want any? Great vintage – I don’t care what they say about American wines, the Pacific Northwest is coming out with some _great_ stuff these days. No? Your loss.”

He set his wine glass aside and leaned forward onto the desk, on his elbows. “I’m guessing you’ve already assumed a little bit about what you’re here to talk with me about.”

“Being a demon?”

Crawly snapped his fingers and pointed to Slick. “Right. But never let it be said you don’t have options – everyone else did, right?” Hearts and Droog and Clubs – who’d just ducked in, late – affirmed that they had. “So here’s the option: based on living a life infernal and evil and, in my opinion but never let upper management hear this, _beautifully_ human, and all the other nonsense Hastur and Ligur are going to be jumping down my throat about, you’ve earned yourself a chance to join the Bloody Ranks of Hell and Brimstone as a tempter, demon, etc. The _other_ option –” he paused to glance over a paper he’d produced from the stack on his desk “– ah, let’s see, oh yes, very interesting.” He looked up, brightly. “Your _other_ option is to rotate between Circle 5 – anger, you know, sort of just floating in a swamp – Circle 7 – violence, no surprise there, I think you’re set up for blood and boiling fire and dog maulings – Circle 8 – fraud, sorcery, theft, oh you name it you’ve got all sort of goodies waiting in there – and Circle 9, for the treachery against your country and your Queen. Which I believe involves immersion in ice and perhaps getting your head gnawed on.” He smiled, snake teeth bared. “So which are we thinking, hm?”

Slick was just staring. Droog had to nudge him, eventually, and he jolted back to the present. “Well that’s pretty fucking obvious, isn’t it?”

Crawly threw up his hands and leaned back. “Just giving you the options, man.” He put his feet up on the desk and the office lights shone off the snakeskin. Slick really hoped those were shoes. “So infernal service it is, yes?” He reached down to a desk drawer and produced a book and a pen. He licked his finger and flipped through the pages, talking all the while. “Your friends will explain the details to you, I’m sure, but basically we’re looking for a group of agents to tempt, wile, promote sin, etc. in the Midnight City region. I’ve been covering the area since it was founded, but it’s not really my base of operations and it’s getting big enough now that we could use a decent demon or a team there. Rumor has it Heaven’s training an agent to thwart said wiles, too, so you should stay entertained.

“And since we were given to understand that you four come as a package deal – you can thank my reports for that, by the way – and had basically been doing our jobs for us for thirty or forty years, we figured why not? Let you get on with it, eh?” He swung his feet to the floor and plunked the book onto the desk, spun it around, and handed Slick the pen. “No need for death to hold you up. Sign there, please, right under that name,” he indicated, jabbing the page with a skinny, manicured finger.

Slick squinted at the signature and then clicked the pen, before dropping it immediately. “Fucking thing’s covered in needles!”

Crawly looked at him, as if this would be obvious. “Well you have to sign in blood _somehow_. Very sophisticated: we had Edison whip it up for us. Siphons it off to the nib. Genius really.” He smiled into his wineglass. “You humans.”

Slick had picked the pen back off the desk and gripped it, gingerly at first, but then clamping down on it, blood trickling down his hand in rivulets, and signed his name across the bottom of the book, the red not-ink burning on the page for a second before Crawly grabbed the pen and the book and fanned the signature. “Beautiful!” He picked up the bottle. “Wine? Ah, right, the horns burn a bit at first, it’ll fade.”

“Yours are black like mine!” Clubs whispered, delightedly. Slick just swallowed a mouthful of wine; it really was very good.

“So we’ll go through a quick run-down of the duties, yes, and then you gentlemen can fill him in on the rest? Droog, you’ve been here long enough, you know the routine.” Droog nodded and Hearts clapped Slick on the shoulder. Crawly smirked. “And then you lot can bugger out of here and get on with it.”

-()-

The tricky part was going to be avoiding people he knew. Part of him – a very un-demonic part of him – wanted to see Karkat and Meg. He made it through three entire days after their re-arrival in the city – which for the city had been six weeks later – before he snuck off from the rest of the Crew and grabbed a phone.

He was a demon, after all, and rules were made to be broken.

“Hello?” Karkat answered. Slick paused, not entirely sure what to say. “Hello?”

“Karkat, it’s Slick.”

Silence. Then, “This isn’t fucking funny, asshole.”

“Karkat, it really is, I –”

“Fuck you, you don’t even _sound_ like him. What kind of fucking sick freak gets off on these goddamn piece of shit pranks? Jesus Christ, if this is you, Egbert, six fucking weeks is _too goddamn soon_.” A pause. “John? Come on man, ‘fess up so I can feel less bad about beating your ass to a fine fucking powder.”

“No, it’s not fucking John.” He went on, faster. “Karkat, listen, I’m not –” The line went dead. Slick stared at the receiver for a second before he slammed it back down and leaned against the wall of the pay phone box, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Droog slipped in to the box, hands in his pockets, and leaned against the opposite wall. “They told you not to contact anybody.”

“He didn’t recognize me!” Slick balled his hand into a fist and slammed it into the side of the phone booth. The plexiglass rattled. “He thought it was a fucking joke!”

“Perception filter. Keeps the horns hidden, and keeps anyone from recognizing you.” He frowned. “We all tested it too.”

“So what, I just … watch? He’s my kid!”

“We ain’t happy about it either, Slick, but it’s the way it is.” He raised an eyebrow. “You think I like just hanging back watching Aradia and that … _boy_ traipse off across the world?”

Slick snorted and looked to the floor. Finally, he moved to leave. “Look like a couple of fuckin’ queers in this phone booth together.”

Droog nodded. “Yes. And watching us right now is a middle-aged man who is getting increasingly angry and will take his indignant rage out later on a convenience store clerk, who will go home and get drunk and have an anonymous hookup out of wedlock with the man jogging down the street.”

Slick looked dubious. “All that shit’s sinning?”

“It’s less about the act than it is the spirit of the thing. If he loved the jogging man, it would be different, but since he’s only gratifying his basest needs, and this will ultimately leave the jogger uncertain and tormented, not to mention unsatisfied, score one for the home team, as it were.” And then, without any warning whatsoever, he grabbed Slick by the lapels and kissed him, full-on, with tongue and everything. Slick made a noise that sounded like ‘MNUUGHF’. Droog pulled away. “There we go, job well done.”

Slick dragged his sleeve across his mouth. “You bastard.”

Droog chuckled and pushed the doors open. “You’ll catch on.”

Dammit, he hated the afterlife.

-()-

It was almost four months before Slick decided to break into Felt mansion and incite some serious paranoia. He was getting the hang of this demon thing by now, and he figured that even if those the green assholes were pretty much a prayer wheel of constant sin anyway, there wouldn’t be anything wrong with having them sin the shit out of each other. Plus, it just sounded like fun.

When he saw Snowman, though, he paused. Sure, making sure Itchy wouldn’t have coffee to fuel him for a few days, thus inciting rage toward all unfortunate passer-by, and hiding Die’s voodoo doll were one thing, but Snowman was another ball game. So instead he went invisible and stalked around behind her, analyzing the situation. She was pouring herself a drink, cigarette between her lips, no holder this time. Slick leaned on the bar next to her.

“God I fucking hate you so much,” he muttered and then, emboldened when she didn’t notice him, he kept going. “I mean, fuck, when you were Queen you were goddamn intolerable, and you were shit at it, and you straight up didn’t do your fucking job _and_ you just let me do all the fucking work. And then, because of fucking _programming_ no one could even hate you for it! Oh, it was the perfect plan; getting your ass exiled was the best thing I ever did.

“And then, and _then_ , you hook up with these fuckers and you have to just keep on making my life a shitfest – still only have one eye, by the way, thanks you fucking bitch – while at the same time making it out to be ‘just business’ or whatever fucking shitty phrase you used to describe it. Because we had the _kids_. Oh, no worries, Slick, I can _rip off your fucking limbs_ but hell, we’ll be civil to each other because our kids were dating or whatever. I’m not sure if I’m more pissed that you were better at it or that you always got your fucking way because _my_ option was to kill you and I couldn’t do that!

“And then,” he added, lower, leaning in, while she sipped her drink, “I had to _get old_ and you didn’t and you just fucking watched. You could have killed me then – I thought you were going to a couple times, I really did – but you let me go and let it happen and _it wasn’t fair_.” He snarled. “It was your most elegant fucking torture: doing goddamn nothing and letting fucking time happen. Goddamn timey wimey bullshit. _You_ didn’t have to watch all those assholes die, _you_ didn’t have to wake up every morning remember all your friends are dead and you’re some goddamn relic, you just had to drop by and remind _me_ of that shit every once and a while.” He bared his teeth. “Fuck you, I hope you die.” He sagged back onto the bar, and frowned, tried to remember why he’d come here in the first place.

She took another sip of her drink. “You done?” She smirked as all the color drained from his face and he went curiously rigid. “Good talk, Slick; I think that was very therapeutic for you.” She turned, so her back was propped against the bar, and wrapped her arm around his shoulders, one finger tracing his horn. “I like it.”

“Perception filter my ass,” was all he could mumble, half-wishing someone would burst in with some holy water and put an end to him.

She leaned closer. “I work for a demon, Slick, and I’m irreparably sewn into the fabric of space-time. There isn’t a filter around that will get one over on me.” She tightened her grip on him, pulled him closer. “It is good to see you again. Glad you landed a decent gig.”

He’d closed his eyes. “You heard all that shit, huh?”

“You were standing right next to me.”

“Well, fuck.”

“If it’s any consolation, it wasn’t easy. All that at the end.” She sipped at her drink for a while before she went on, apparently gathering her thoughts. “I could stop it, you know, your … I could keep you from getting older – I knew I could. And you were so _tired_ , even if you tried not to act like it. After Sleuth died, all I wanted to do was –” she stopped then, and took a breath. “There were a lot of things I wanted to do. But I knew it would be better this way. I’ll admit it took a meeting with Doc Scratch to assure me of it, though.”

The stood in silence for a while. “So this is what we do now? Fuck around and have a feelingsjam?” Slick asked, not looking at her.

“Unless you can think of a way to tempt me. I don’t envy you that task.” She flicked his horn and he flinched, scowling at her. “How’s the demon thing working out?”

“Fine. Uh, evil.”

She swirled her drink. “Fuck around and talk about feelings,” she mused.

“Fuckin’ apparently.”

“We’ve only done fifty percent of that.”

She set the glass aside and grabbed his lapels. He held up a finger. “I …” He stopped, basically because she was kissing him, and he did really miss it, to be honest, even if he did still hate her guts. “I,” he murmured, when she pulled back to breathe, “am receptive to this sequence of events.”

She smirked, her lips brushing against his. “Good.”

Well, perhaps there were worse afterlives. Perhaps.

-()-

They’d been back in town for five years or so when Crawly – Crowley, whatever – showed up to appraise their work. “I crashed the entire internet for ten whole hours!” Clubs chirped, almost immediately, and you’d have thought he’d told Crowley Christmas was cancelled permanently, he got so happy.

Droog handed him a spreadsheet of the hard numbers, and the elder demon looked impressed. “Nice,” he said, unfolding it. “Rolling in souls.” He tucked the paperwork into a coat pocket and looked around the table to the four of them, Slick and Hearts nursing their drinks with a slowness that was completely out of habit and not necessity. “Probably not gonna stay the case though, hate to tell you guys.”

Slick’s teeth scored a couple lines in the glass. “No?”

“Nah. Seems Heaven’s noticed your handiwork too, decided to make everything a little more balanced. They’re worried you have a home field advantage, so they’re bringing in some locals.”

Clubs looked disappointed. “So Castiel is going to leave?” Crowley nodded. Clubs raised his glass of chocolate milk. “To Castiel. I liked him.”

“Sayonara, Mr. Roboto,” Slick muttered. “Who’re the new gravestuffers?”

“I’m sure you’ll run into them. My ang – _associate_ is in town this dropping them off this week.”

“Let’s kill ‘em.”

“Good by me,” Hearts grumbled.

Crowley rolled his eyes. “Give ‘em a week or two, guys, geeze. Take it easy. You’re not careful you’ll have Laizaus up your asses and you don’t want him, believe me. Piece of shit and his stupid Bugatti,” he muttered to his drink.

“What’s a Bugatti?”

“It’s a car, Clubs; Jesus you’re stupid,” Slick grumbled. “Alright, fine, we take it easy on ‘em for a couple weeks. _Then_ we kill ‘em.”

Crowley sighed and looked around. “Alright, guys, off the record I’m gonna give you some advice. _Don’t_ kill them.”

Droog and Slick exchanged looks, puzzled. “But they’re new, they oughta –”

“No, listen.” Crowley leaned in, lowered his voice. “I’ve been doing this for _awhile_ , guys, and the more you burn through new guys the more Above ends up sending real assholes, alright? Droog, think about it: Laizaus.”

“Who _is_ this asshole?”

“He wears trucker hats and drinks more than you do.” Droog sniffed. “And plaid.”

“Oh, the horror, be still my fucking heart _oh wait_.”

Crowley just shook his head. “Listen: the trick is to get some guys in you all can tolerate, right, and just sort of … balance it out.” He was met by four blank looks. “It’s not hard! You tempt, they thwart, you win some, you lose some, you just keep it _even_.”

“But –” Droog started.

“No, none of that. Things stay even and Heaven and Hell stay off everyone’s backs.” He leaned in more, half-hissing. “Things start looking good for either side and we’re going to have an Antichrist to deal with, you see?”

“Yay!” Clubs cheered. Hearts thwacked him across the back of the head, while Crowley put his face in his hands.

“ _No_ , not yay, Clubs. Bless it, I’m trying to _avoid that_.”

“Why?” Droog asked, spearing an olive in his drink.

“End of the universe? Battle between Heaven and Hell? No one else would rather avoid that?”

“I would,” Slick mumbled.

“You’re fucking the universe on the side,” Hearts pointed out.

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Oh.” Clubs frowned. “So … we work _with_ the angels?”

“Ye – No, not exactly. Unless you want to. Er. Probably not a good idea though. Unless you’re really careful.” He closed his eyes and shook his head. “Listen, if you want you can come up with some kind of Arr – arrangement. Or Arrangement. Whatever. But you don’t _have_ to. Just make sure everything’s even, _alright_?” He looked to them, a little drunk and a little bewildered. “Capisce?”

The Crew exchanged looks, and then Slick shrugged. “Whatever you say.”

Crowley looked around and then sighed, his wine glass refilling itself. “Don’t even know why I’m worried – you all are gonna know each other anyway.”

“Well,” Droog said, frowning. “That makes things interesting.”

-()-

Slick wouldn’t admit to laying low and waiting to run across the angels for the next couple of days, but that was essentially what he did. The Crew didn’t remark on it either, maybe because they were thinking the same thing.

It shouldn’t be taking this long, Slick thought. Midnight City wasn’t _that_ big and angels stuck out like a sore thumb, if only because of all the smiling and happy fucking bunnies that seemed to flock in their wake. He and Droog had been wracking their brains as to who was decent enough that they knew to end up in Heaven. That Egbert kid’s Dad, probably, maybe that band director, WV or whatever his name actually was …

The correct assumption had never occurred to either of them. And when they saw who it was, they both nearly had heart attacks, despite not having actual hearts anymore.

“Oh, GPI,” Droog breathed, half-crouched behind a dumpster.

“How the _fuck_ did this happen?!” Slick hissed. He was behind the dumpster too, but there was significantly less crouching going on. “They – Fuck, virtuous?! _Them_?”

“This is a prank, Slick. It has to be.”

“ _He has a halo_.”

“It’s –”

“And _he’s_ been dead longer than you have!” Slick pulled his hat down over his head. “This isn’t happening. I’m still alive. I’m drunk. I’m hallucinating wildly. Maybe I’m on life support. Fuck, yes, that’s it, I’m jacked up on fucking chemicals and I’ve just lost total fucking touch with reality.”

“None of that is true.” He raised an eyebrow. “You’re not happy about this?”

“It probably isn’t even really them, just looks like them from behind.” Slick jumped up and dug around in the dumpster, re-emerging with a soda can. “Check this out.” He lobbed the can at the shorter of the two angels and nailed him clean in the back of the head, almost knocking that stupid hat off his head. The angel jumped, his hand flying to the back of his head, and he spun.

“Oh,” Slick said, expression changing from frustrated denial to shock. “It is him.”

“Yes,” Droog agreed, when the first angel’s companion realized the conversation had tailed off, and likewise turned around. “Yes it is.”

Problem Sleuth hit Spades Slick at top speed, and bore the two of them into the brick wall of the alley. “Goddammit I hate fucking hugs,” Slick griped, but there was no vemon in it. Sleuth kissed him rather than saying anything, and Slick kissed him back, for longer than was probably decent but whatever, he was a fucking demon, this probably counted for a lot of points. Tempting an angel. Not kissing Problem Sleuth, who’d been dead and gone and …

Fuck it, he was kissing Problem Sleuth.

“Your fucking halo looks goddamn stupid,” he muttered, when they broke apart.

“The horns suit you.”

“Fuck you.” He was aware that Droog and Pickle Inspector or whatever the hell that guy’s name was were having a similar if slightly more tame reunion in the shadows across from them. He wrenched Sleuth down to him and kissed him again. And then he stabbed him.

“Slick, really?” Sleuth sighed, as he picked at the blood-soaked rip in the cloth. “I know you missed me but it’s not like I could help i – hnurgh.” Slick just stuck his tongue in Sleuth’s mouth; it was the only reliable way to get the man to shut up and stop being so goddamn stupid.

“This shirt’s going to be ruined,” Sleuth griped. “Thwarting wiles doesn’t pay well, you know.”

“Fuck, Sleuth, I will _buy you_ a new shirt.”

Sleuth knocked his forehead into Slick’s, and Slick slouched back against the bricks. “I’m dubious,” the former detective smirked. “Seems pretty undemonic.”

“I’ll be sure to burn the fucking store down when I’m done.”

“Mm. I might have to go along to thwart you, now.”

Slick shrugged, and then smirked. “We can fucking work it out.” Sleuth kissed him, briefly. “Come to some stupid agreement.”

-()-

On the balcony of the café across the street, Crowley looked impressed. “Angel, I’m …” He leaned onto the table. “I’m honestly speechless. This was underhanded by _my_ standards.”

“Look how happy they all are,” Aziraphale sighed. “I don’t think we have to worry about balance, my dear.”

“How did you get Heaven to _agree to this_?” Crowley gestured to them with his wineglass, which sloshed the red stuff all over the table. Aziraphale frowned, just a little. “They had to know! This is insane! Ridiculous!”

“I didn’t get anyone to agree to anything, Crowley.” He mopped up the wine with a napkin, and then miracled the stain out. “Direct orders from the top, apparently.”

“And you knew but didn’t tell anyone?” Crowley smirked. “That’s _lying_ , angel. They made a mistake and _you_ –”

“The top doesn’t make mistakes.” Aziraphale waved a hand and sat back. “It’s all ineffable, dear, I’m sure of it. Part of the Plan.”

Crowley looked at him sidelong, dubious. “Yeah, yeah.” He sloshed back a mouthful of wine. “Everything’s ineffable with you.”

“Hm.” Quickly, before Crowley really had time to register what happened, Aziraphale pecked him on the cheek. Crowley blinked, hardly noticing his glasses sliding down his nose. Then he whirled to the angel.

“What was _that_ for?”

“What? Oh.” He shrugged. “What do you think it was for?” He smiled smugly, wire frame glasses riding up as his nose crinkled.

“Well,” Crowley started, and then he scowled in the face of Aziraphale’s unabashedly cheerful smile. “If you say it’s ineffable I am going to … tempt that old lady.” He raised a finger. “I’ll do it. I will. Don’t _make me_ – oh,” he said, as clearly as he could with Aziraphale’s mouth on his. “’Kay.”

-()-

A white cloud floated through the azure sky over Midnight City that day, and from a certain angle, before the wind took it and twisted it, it might have looked like a lotus petal.

Far above, Godhead Pickle Inspector sipped his tea and smiled ineffably - but fondly, _so_ fondly - down on his creation.


End file.
